


Galactic Symmetry

by ArcticLucie



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Birth to Death, Birthday, Birthday Presents, Earthborn (Mass Effect), I Made Myself Cry, Love, M/M, Ruthless (Mass Effect)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-11
Updated: 2015-04-11
Packaged: 2018-03-22 07:53:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3721081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArcticLucie/pseuds/ArcticLucie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A compilation of Shepard's birthdays in honor of his -139th.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Galactic Symmetry

John Shepard was born in the middle of a raging thunderstorm in April, and the galaxy never let him forget it.

 

***

 

His sixth birthday is hazy at best. His mother, or rather a woman he assumes was his mother, brings in a cake she baked from the kitchen, chocolate with vanilla frosting that tastes more like butter than sugar, but it still manages to get eaten.

He gets a plastic model of some ancient starship that had been decommissioned centuries ago wrapped in butcher paper as his only present, _Apollo_ or something like that, but it flies through the stars on the tips of his fingers just the same.

 

***

 

He spends his twelfth birthday in a heap of pain after taking his first bullet, a graze on his skull just above his left eye that is sewn up with dental floss curtesy of one of his Red brothers. His head feels like it might just split in two, but it could've been worse. That's life on the streets and he deals with it like he does everything else, with a crooked smile and a cocky attitude.

There is no cake or even food to speak of that day, but Finch presents him with a gift that was stolen off someone, he's sure, if the inscription on the blade is anything to go by. "To my loving son: good luck" it reads, and it always will be as it gets him through his time in the Reds, and later, N training and the war of all wars.

 

***

 

His eighteenth is more vivid, but that's mostly due to the fact that he thought he'd never see it. The recruitment office is almost barren, the smell of industrial cleaner strong as he sits and waits for his name to be called. An older man walks out from the back, datapad in hand, followed by the recruiter as he stands to greet them.

"Where'd you get the scar, son?" the older man asks, 'Anderson' it reads on his BDU's.

"Shootout at the O.K. Corral," he smirks.

"Cowboys or Earps?"

"Unfortunately, Cowboys, sir, but I'm looking to convert. Red's not really my color any more," he replies as they share a brief laugh.

"I wouldn't go betting on black just yet," Anderson says as he takes a moment to study him. "Welcome aboard...Sims, make sure he gets sent to Vancouver," he says with a wink as he walks out the door.

 

***

 

He's on Torfan for his twenty-fourth, in a barrage of bullets and up to his knees in the muck and the blood of a hundred dead Batarians. Maybe someday the galaxy will get the message not to shoot at him on his birthday.

 

***

 

His thirtieth is spent on the SR-1, and the victory was two-fold after defeating Sovereign. He wakes up in a daze, Kaidan's lips assaulting every part of him all at once, so it seems, until he flares from the pleasure and fades back into sleep. Most of his birthdays to follow will start out just the same but not until he turns thirty-five.

 

***

 

Thirty-six is harder than he thought it would be, but that's because he's forced to share it with his newborn Krogan daughter, and she's even grouchier than him in the mornings before coffee. But Kaidan is smiling at him through teary eyes, and he supposes it won't be so bad. He still has that rocket, the knife, and his dog tags, and just like them, he'll never give her up.

 

***

 

Forty-two is the meaning of life and his has only gotten better with age.

 

***

 

The second time he wakes up on his forty-eighth birthday, it's under a pile of two Salarian seven year-olds and a three year-old's slobbery kisses. He looks over to the doorway at the sound of Kaidan's raspy chuckle and melts under the warmth of his smile. In trots Grunt and twelve year-old Max with breakfast in hand, and he wonders how he got so lucky as to have the best view on the Citadel from his bed.

 

***

 

His ninety-sixth is spent with children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and the rest of the family he has acquired on his way. The galaxy has steadily recovered and he's glad he's been there to see it up close. There is beauty there, in the remapped skylines, but he'll never have to look far for a glimpse into heaven, just a turn of his head to the ever-present man by his side.

The day is spent at the Shepard-Alenko orchard where they celebrate milestones and marriages and mourn all those that they've lost, but he knows that if it all ends tomorrow or he has a hundred more years to go, his life has been more than he ever could have dreamed.

 

***

 

A hundred and seventy-four trips the Earth has taken around Sol since his birth. It's been a helluva ride, but life's gotten lonely since Kaidan went. For years he thought he'd be going out young in a blaze of bullets and glory, but then he found his brown-eyed biotic and almost a century and a half wasn't nearly enough spent with the love of his life. 

He hears the crackle of thunder outside, sees the flicker of lightening, an April shower hyped up on stims, and he knows he's going out the same way he came in: in the middle of a raging thunderstorm on the wings of galactic symmetry. 

And his last thought is of those whiskey eyes as his own finally burn out for good.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I can't help but cry when I think, write, or read about Shepard and Kaidan's death even if it's of old age, which is why I usually don't. Spirits, I'm such a sap.


End file.
